Marlene

Although I ended up with an Egg, the one thing I really liked about the Primo, is the ablility to easily divide the charcoal area so you can have direct and indirect cooking going on at the same time. all three are good, just depends on what you're going to use it for the most. The egg really does require the platesetter to take the best advantage of it.

When I'm at the cottage, I will plan a weeks worth of meals since the nearest town is half an hour away and it tends to be a 2 1/2 round trip by the time I'm done. I don't plan a menu as such as we're going to eat such and such on Tuesday, but I get the weeks supply of fruit and veg and dairy in one trip. I really only want to do it once. In the city, no way. Because my freezer is well stocked with meat, the closest I get is checking the freezer the night before to take something out. The next day, I tend to shop for the sides.

If you want to regulate salt, regulate it in processed foods. Restaurant cooks and chefs have for the most part, presumably have been taught to salt appropriately. Chain restaurants may be somewhat different and on a level a step or two above processed foods. But at some point, we need to tell Big Brother to just butt out.

That looks really good Anna, and so does the schnitzel from the last outing, although, you may have my calamari. I am sorry I couldn't go with you today, but I am all set for next week. I'll leave myself entirely in yours and Kerry's capable food hands.

I put my regular All Clad and my copper core All Clad in the dishwasher all the time. I love my copper core, but it's not induction approved, but the regular stainless is. Neither have suffered any harm by going in the dishwasher.

We'll be at the tower suites at Encore Wynn in November. After staying at the Wynn when it first opened a few years ago, then back to the Wynn, then Encore when it opened, we wouldn't stay anywhere else. The one thing Steve Wynn does better than anyone else, is service. I am looking forward to hopefully trying Tableau this time around. We're only there three days this time and all of our meals are booked at the Wynn or at Encore.

We have bags of chips for the smaller ones, plus chocolate bars. The big kids get the mini chocolate bars.

I do this with any braised chicken dish as a matter of course now, otherwise you just have flabby chicken skin. Bletch.

For a chain, Capital Grille is actually not bad, at least the ones I've been too. I haven't been to the one in NY yet though. But I agree, if they are coming to NY, go to an original NY steakhouse. I do like Wolfgang's a lot

Wolfgang's I believe he used to be the Maitre'd at Lugers at one time. I've eaten at both the Park Avenue and the Tribeca locations and loved both of them

I can vouch for Dave's slow roasting method. It works very very well. I do braise short ribs mostly, and somewhere is Recipe Gullet is the recipe I use most, Short ribs braised with wine, port and honey. They're pretty awesome. But lately, I've been doing an asian glazed braised short rib too.

For me, Sunday dinner is always a roast. Pork or beef, sometimes a roast chicken, maybe a ham. It is the one meal of the week that everyone sits down as a family around the table. We don't do it so much in the summer, because of travels back and forth from the cottage, but in the winter, Sunday roast dinner is a tradition that I have done for years.

Right, that's the 11 (i think) tine whisk. You can buy it and it's worth every penny. Not just because it works faster and whips in more air, but because it lets you whip small quantities. You can easily whip a single egg white with it. Forget about trying this with the original whisk ... maybe you could do it but would take half a day. Exactly. I love that whip and I am going to buy one for my 600 at the cottage as well.

I have a 600 at the cottage and a 610 at home. The wire whip on the 610 is different. At one time you couldn't buy that whip separately, but I think you can now, and i'm sure it will fit on the 600.

I almost always make the Bouchon or Ratio quiche (they're pretty close to the same thing). I like the height and the custard. However, I just got Michael Roux' book "Eggs" and he advocates a flan ring of 1 1/4 inches deep. Seems to me that's a decent compromise, and I want to try this one as soon as I get a flan ring.

I was at a friend's cottage on the weekend and she roasted red peppers, then peeled them and tore into strips. In a pan, she sauteed garlic and onion till soft, then added some homemade marinara sauce and then added the roasted red peppers. This could be served on crostini as an app or as a side dish, but boy was it good.

Have you read Julie Powell's book, Cleaving? Much of it has to do with her quest to become a butcher.

I tried this tonight. I got mixed results. About half the flour simply fell off the chicken, so that wasn't good. But the crust that remained was awesome. Thin and crispy and really really good. Now I just have to figure out how to get the flour to stick!

It's an odd thing but if I don't have breakfast, I can go without eating lunch, too. But if I eat breakfast, I tend to want to eat lunch, too, as if eating breakfast has primed the pump, so to speak. Growing up, we always had breakfast. Not eating it was never an option. But as an adult, I can take it or leave it. Lately, I've been making just a breakfast smoothie and taking that to work. I'm not a fan of fruit (thanks to my mom foisting gobs of fruit on us as kids) so the smoothie is my way of getting fruits into my diet. That's because you haven't :"woken" up your metabolizm with food yet. Something I learned in weight watchers. I was considered an "undereater" rather than an "over eater" which is just as bad for weight gain as your body never knows when you're going to feed it, so it stores fat just in case. I often do this as well. If I eat breakfast, I will be hungry for lunch. If I don't, I won't be. I generally eat something very light like a yogurt before working out. By then, it's 10 or so, and I'm ready for something like a bagel, english muffin or bowl of fruit. When I don't eat lunch, which is often, I'll have an early dinner. Lunch tends to mean I eat much later at night, which isn't good for the system either. I will eat brunch on the weekends, mostly because my husband makes it. Since we don't eat till 11 or so usually because everyone sleeps in, we go with two meals on the weekends.

There's always broc and hollandaise Or roasted with some olive oil and garlic. The roasted garlic is a wonderful foil to the broc. Or a gratin. Dave's link to that recipe is pretty close to mine. Or as a crudite. Blanch, chill, serve with an awesome dip. Cream of broccoli soup. The possibilities are endless.

So the lad has been in residence for a week, prior to starting up classes. Apparently, his roommate cooks as well. I sent Ry a couple of cookbooks and they are going to take turns making dinner for the two of them. It is greek salad tonight I understand. He's not going to starve I guess.

At the cottage, I've gone to a full upright freezer and a full fridge, no freezer in it. I have a lot more space this way for everything. Although I confess, I do also still have a top freezer model, which now holds the beer and martini glasses in the freezer part. They aren't side by side, but I'm only in the freezer a couple of times of day so it's easy for it to live in the back room

I use my iPad in the kitchen constantly. Because I use MacGourmet, all my recipes are on my iPad. I either use it without a case, but on the keyboard dock, or I use this one, with a screen protector in case

I don't think I ever ate at my college cafeteria. I had my own apartment and I worked at a restaurant while going to school. My son heads off to college next week, and his cafeteria is worked by the Culinary Arts students so there should be some decent food there!

I am the Meat Queen.